Broadside entitled 'Loss of the Benlomond steam boat!'

Commentary

This news report begins: 'A full and particular account of the Loss of the Benlomond Steam Boat, in the Firth of Forth, this morning, when on her passage from Newhaven to Alloa and Stirling.' The publisher was Francis McCartney of Edinburgh.

The incident reported here is not at all well-known in Scotland today, but had circumstances been different it might be remembered as one of the worst transport disasters ever to befall the country. All the passengers aboard the burning steamer 'Ben Lomond' were rescued by local fishermen from Cramond on the Firth of Forth. Steam cruises on the Forth-Clyde canal and in the Firths of Forth and Clyde were highly popular in the nineteenth century.

Broadsides are single sheets of paper, printed on one side, to be read unfolded. They carried public information such as proclamations as well as ballads and news of the day. Cheaply available, they were sold on the streets by pedlars and chapmen. Broadsides offer a valuable insight into many aspects of the society they were published in, and the National Library of Scotland holds over 250,000 of them.